Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW
Necessity for Public Educational Work Now Being Realized by the Trade and
Steps Being Taken to That End—The Lack of Interest Displayed by News-
papers in General—The Mission of the Player-Piano and How it Is Fulfilled
The trade is coming to complete realization
of the necessity for doing something to stir up
the dormant love of music in the American
people. Without the slightest desire to pose,
we cannot resist the temptation of remarking
that The Review began preaching, something
like five years ago, in special relation to the
piano trade, the very doctrines which, are to-
day, being set forth as essential to that trade's
salvation. We were fortunate enough to fore-
see the trend of events.
The trade is definitely awakened. The Na-
tional Bureau for the Advancement of Music,
under the leadership of C. M. Tremaine, pro-
poses to begin systematically the work of cul-
tivating a desire for the possession of musical
instruments among the American people. In
the following remarks, we propose to lay down
certain observations which seem pertinent, es-
pecially with relation to our own thought and
experience concerning the special case of the
player-piano.
Of course, it will be recognized that the
player-piano is the great future instrument, and
that any contribution that can be made towards
a better understanding of its possibilities, and
of means for increasing the scope and quantity
of its distribution, must be welcome.
The Public Must Be Educated
We think, to begin at the beginning, that it
is useless to expect from the American people
any special enthusiasm for artistic things un-
less some definite campaign of education is set
forth to them systematically, methodically and
on a large scale. The only—but sufficient—
trouble with the player from the beginning has
been that its merits have been taken for granted.
It has been assumed that because the in-
ventors, manufacturers and sellers have known
those merits, therefore the public must know
them, too. Yet, if there is one thing more cer-
tain than another it is that the public will by
no means share in the trade's enthusiasm until
some very good reason for doing so has been
well pounded into them.
It is deplorably true, to go a step further, that
the treatment meted out to music by American
newspapers is in the highest degree humiliating.
It is only necessary to look through the columns
of newspapers in the various great cities to see
that musical news is bracketed with what is
called society, and is treated purely from a
social standpoint. Musical criticism, outside
of the first four cities of the country, prac-
tically is non-existent in the daily papers. Even
when they do have regular music departments
they seem to think it wrong to mention a piano's
name, though it is all right to boost automo-
biles. Criticism of musical events is honorably
and well done in New York, Boston and Phila-
delphia, and to a less extent in Chicago; but
where else do the daily newspapers give a re-
spectable amount of space to any musical event
except the opera, when it comes, or to some
widely advertised pianist or violinist. And in
these latter cases, the treatment is nine-tenths
social and one-tenth musical.
Of course, it will be urged that the newspaper
follows the requirements of its readers and fur-
nishes them with what they want, not with what
they ought to want. To an extent it is true
that the shabby treatment given to music in
the papers is only the reflection of the indiffer-
ence with which that art is regarded by the vast
majority of men and women in this country,
including, we regret to say, a great many mem-
bers of the piano trade itself.
In such circumstances, and considering the
almost universal indifference of the people to
music as an art, it seems somewhat surprising
that so many pianos, player-pianos and talking
machines are actually sold. The truth seems
to be that people like music, and like it very
much, as long as they are not afraid of it, but
that just as soon as it gets into the papers,
they mix it up with visions of the millionaire's
fat wives going to grand opera and then to
sleep, with ideas of horribly unintelligible re-
citals by long-haired foreigners, and with mem-
ories of the artistic jargon talked by the musi-
cians of their acquaintance. In short, music in
America, speaking from the point of view of its
organization, has always been an exotic, where-
as American music, as planted in the hearts of
the American people, is just as sound a plant
as any other. The only trouble with it is that
it has never had a chance to grow into any-
thing.
Player-Piano Has Not Fulfilled Its Mission
The coming of the player-piano, it was gen-
erally believed, by the present writer as en-
thusiastically as by anyone else, would bring
about an altogether different state of affairs.
The expectation was disappointed. It turned
out that the public had no objection to the
player-piano for rag-time and dances, but the
advertising of it in the early days went on the
supposition that this public were musical and
could understand musical thoughts; a supposi-
tion altogether wrong. The only consequence
has been that the advertising of the player has
created expectations never to be realized, that
the personal control feature has been wrongly
explained, and that the player-piano has literally
done nothing to help along the cause of music
or even to give itself a national popularity. In-
deed, it has been sold largely, but not half large-
ly enough; for on its bare merits it ought, ere
this, to have supplanted the straight upright
piano entirely. It has been sold to the music-
lovers who want easy, noisy music right at
home without much care for whether it is done
well, or not.
Educational Movement Now Under Way
Well, now, the new movement begins.
Among other things, it proposes to encourage
the syndication of musical pages throughout
the newspapers of the country, so that every
newspaper reader in the United States shall re-
ceive, at regular intervals, suggestions, ideas
and interesting facts about music in the home,
to the end that the message may be carried
into every music-less family circle throughout
this land.
The idea is excellent, and we hope it will go
further even than this. But there is one point
not to be overlooked. The principal enemy of
the piano is an enemy that works from within.
The piano trade itself is responsible for most
of the contempt and indifference of the public
towards pianos and player-pianos. Piano sales-
men are indifferent to the musical value of
pianos, player salesmen, cannot play the instru-
ment they sell, dealers advertise exclusively on
prices and terms, values are slashed everywhere,
and the retail business is conducted on the plan
of a cheap-jack-sale. In the circumstances,
how is it to be expected that the public should
really be enthusiastic about pianos and player-
pianos? It is impossible to take such interest
in something you buy only because it is the
thing to have one, and the price and terms make
it easy!
The Importance of Good Newspaper Copy
So that, it would seem to be one of the first
and most important parts of the new Bureau's
business to advise the retail trade as to methods
for building constructive sales-producing player-
piano copy. To get such copy distributed
throughout the trade and to bring every re-
tailer in the country under the influence of such
work, would be a task worthy of the highest
intellectual powers and, if successful, an ac-
complishment of the highest value to music, to
the piano trade and to the country at large. Let
us never forget that the ennobling influence of
musical feeling cannot be left out of the compo-
sition of national character without the cer-
tainty that in place of it will be some other
feature ignoble and mean. This again, directly,
reflects upon the prosperity of every maker and
seller of musical instruments.
The player-piano especially is in need of con-
structive advertising copy, for the player has
been the worst sufferer from stupidity and ig-
norance. Let this be one of the first studies
of the new Bureau; the problem presented by
the player-piano and the means desirable for
putting it before the public interestingly, clever-
ly, suggestively, and in a manner calculated to
produce sales.
We do not contemplate the setting up of any
dictatorial board, with powers of inquisition,
for the individual retailer will not endure any-
thing that he deems interference with his busi-
ness. The most important thing to be done
is to set a good example. For instance, the
Bureau might offer to furnish copy on general
lines of publicity to the trade. It might pub-
lish a book of good suggestions along these
lines. It might consult with, and advise, from
the trade standpoint, the conductors of syndi-
cated music-pages. It might use its power to
encourage the support by advertising, of papers
that carry the music pages. It might act con-
stantly as a medium between the public and
the trade, putting its intelligence and its fa-
cilities at the trade's disposal, seeking only to
do good.
Let the following statement be pondered seri-
ously: The American public have never yet
thought of music as a natural part of the lives
of men and women. But this has been because
music to them has meant, not the fine old strains
of their boyhood and girlhood days, but the
frozen circles of an unintelligible jargonic art.
They have always been afraid of music. They will
never cease to be afraid of it till it is brought to
them as one brings the alphabet to the attention
of a little child. Therefore, since advertising is
the most effective motive power of any national
movement, constructive advertising is the great-
est need of the hour. Therefore, and for the
same reason, the player-piano being the one
that is hardest to introduce to public apprecia-
tion, intelligently and constructively, the great-
est amount of intelligent effort now available,
is needed in the preparation of constructive ad-
vertising copy, devoted to the promotion of
player sales. Lastly, the promotion of the
player is the promotion of the most profitable
part of the music business.
The Gaskin Music Store, of Suffolk, Va., is
remodeling its headquarters, and will instal
plate glass, sound-proof demonstration booths
for player-pianos and talking machines.
Worcester Wind Motor Co.
WORCESTER, MASS.
Makers of Absolutely Satisfactory
WIND MOTORS for PLAYER-PIANOS
Also all kinds of Pneumatics and Supplies
IIUIIIIilllllllllllllllUIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIM^